Biography Puppet Interviews in 3rd Grade

Third graders have finished their biography puppet interviews. Students worked in groups of two and three to research a famous person, created a puppet version of the person in art and then did an interview-style puppet show with the information they gathered. Below are a few samples of our work. To see all of the puppet shows, visit our SchoolTube channel and search by keywords, "biography puppets & your teacher's last name:
biography puppets & Monteiro
biography puppets & D'Ambra
biography puppets & Brun

Albert Einstein

Neil Armstrong

Gabby Douglas

Harry Houdini

Christopher Paul Curtis
 

Hilary Clinton



Here is the list of people researched:

Monteiro Helen Keller Chief Joseph Gabby Douglas Neil Armstrong Steve Jobs Roberto Clemente Charles Drew Ella Fitzgerald

Brun Albert Einstein Harry Houdini Christopher Paul Curtis Jeff Gordon Georgia Okeefe Althea Gibson Sacagawea Barbara Park

D’Ambra Louis Armstrong George Lucas Hillary Clinton Wilma Rudolph Grace Lin Sally Ride Snowflake Bentley

Find out how this fits in with Common Core Standards and library standards here >>

If Not for the Cat: Haiku Riddles

Students in Miss Edwards and Mrs. McKinnon's classes experimented with haiku riddles after reading Jack Prelutsky's If Not for the Cat. The book has 17 haiku that form a riddle about a certain animal. Haiku is a form of Japanese poetry with 17 total syllables about the natural world. The poem is broken into three lines with 5 syllables on the first line, 7 syllables on the second line and 5 syllables on the third line. Can you guess the students' haiku riddle?


It lays eggs on land.
It's body has a hard shell.
It loves to swim slow.

Answer: A turtle

Snow comes from the sky.
It's cold and makes people sick.
It's white everywhere.

Answer: winter

It's black and yellow.
They can fly around outside.
They can be sneaky.

Answer: a bee

How to Bicycle to the Moon in 9 Steps...and Take a Selfie

Last week, due to testing in the library, Mrs. Cabral's class took a break from our Easel.ly infographics on the computers and I read the instructional picture book, How to Bicycle to the Moon to Plant Sunflowers by Mordicai Gerstein. Written from a young boy's perspective, he outlines 24 steps to bicycle to the moon and plant sunflowers including the physics of getting there, acquiring a spacesuit, and convincing your parents. After reading the book, students created their own version using a 9-panel comic style organizer. The activity helped students practice sequencing, instructional writing, and using their imaginations to make the impossible possible.

Austin used traditional carpentry to build a ramp and supplemented with jet packs:

 Sam took the thrifty approach and fashioned a ladder out of monkey bars using a blow torch:

Elijah catapulted bike and all and ended the trip with makeshift wings:

Zoe made sure she had a food sack, jet packs, and the proper suit:

Samantha suggested sleeping on the moon to make sure the sunflowers took:

Kennedy launched from a giant slingshot:

Elizabeth used 5 Dumbo elephants to get to the moon:

Lily's final step was to return home and have horrible nightmares about the whole ordeal:

And in true 2014 fashion, Sam took a selfie on the moon so he could post on Facebook.

Reader's Theater in 2nd Grade: Calabash Kids

I love reader's theater. Students read an adapted folktale aloud together to hear a great story, practice speaking,  develop fluency, work collaboratively, and just plum have fun with expressive reading. Scholastic does an awesome job of explaining why reader's theater is valuable. And of course, it falls right in line with the Common Core Standards listed below.

In second grade, we performed a reader's theater of The Calabash Kids: A Tale of Tanzania by Aaron Shepard as a culmination of our unit on folktales. We had read and discussed folktales from several different continents including, The Empty Pot by Demi, The Hatseller and the Monkeys by Baba Wague Diakite, and Wiley and the Hairy Man (one of my favorites!) by Molly Bang. Each student got a booklet of The Calabash Kids story with their part highlighted. There were also several whole group parts which kept everyone engaged even after their individual lines were over. We talked about using expressive voices while reading and staying "on-script." My favorite thing about this lesson was that it leveled the playing field for all. Everyone was able to participate equally regardless of reading level. Students waited in anticipation for their part, followed along religiously, and spoke with confidence and flair when it came to their turn. We didn't record this version but are currently working on a new poetry reader's theater that we will turn into a multimedia presentation. Stay tuned!

Common Core Standards:
RL 2.2: Recount stories, including fables and folktales from diverse cultures, and determine their central message, lesson, or moral.
RL2.6: Acknowledge differences in the points of view of characters, including by speaking in a different voice for each character when reading dialogue aloud. 
SL 2.1 Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about grade 2 topics and texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups.

Spring Poetry

To celebrate National Poetry Month, kindergarten classes created their own poems to express the arrival of spring. We talked about how poetry sometimes involves rhythm, rhyme and repetition but doesn't have to. We also discussed that poetry makes you feel something about whatever you are writing. Here are the poems we generated as a class in the three different kindergartens. We wrote them together, students illustrated,  and we practiced saying them aloud with feeling in our voices.


Spring is warm.
Spring is beautiful.
Spring is flowers.
Spring is trees.

Spring is flying birds.
Spring is flowers.
Spring is sun.
Spring is fun.






Spring is water.
Spring is flowers.
Spring is birds.
Spring is warm.

Easel.ly Infographics in 4th Grade

Students in 4th grade researched "Life as a Kid" on Culturegrams and compared it with life as a kid in the United States by filling in Venn diagrams. As a final project, students are recreating their Venn diagrams on Easel.ly, an online infographic creator. They need to include a title, two sides of the Venn diagram with headers, the middle comparison piece, at least one graphic, and a bibliography. Easel.ly infographics can then be shared electronically or printed. Stay tuned for finished products in the weeks to come.

Standards:
This project covers a slew of library Standards for the 21st Century Learner and has multiple Common Core components. Below are 2 that I specifically targeted for these lessons.
AASL Standard 3.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to organize and display knowledge and understanding in ways that others can view, use, and assess.
CCSS W.4.8 Recall relevant information from experiences or gather relevant information from print and digital sources; take notes and categorize information, and provide a list of sources.